The thin line between love and hate

In the past few days, there have been two vital bits of web flotsam that I have been moved by. Both involve the new Star Trek movie, and, between the two of them, they are giving me some very conflicted emotions about this re-imagining.

On the positive side, we have the new Star Trek trailer (images from which come from the ever-faithful trekmovie.com website). This is the third Trek trailer to be released, and they just keep getting better and better. Although nothing, for me, will come close to the anticipation and excitement I felt from seeing the two Phantom Menace trailers, this last Trek trailer punched all of my fan boy buttons big-time. Of particular interest was the first on-screen speech by Captain Pike, whose character has always fascinated me.

I already like this character. I want to know more about Pike, just from hearing a few snatches of dialog. Heck, at this point, they could move the Kirk character into the background, and give the movie to this guy. He looks like a starship captain, and he sounds like a starship captain. As it happens, way more than the new Kirk. But to be fair, the movie is about how Kirk became THE Jim Kirk, so we have to allow for some character development, I suppose.

Speaking of Kirk, another view getting a big fan reaction is our first glimpse of Kirk sitting in the captain's chair for the very first time. The center seat on the bridge has always been a powerful symbol for me, and I once had a beloved poster of William Shatner's Kirk sitting at his rightful place on the Enterprise's bridge. While I don't think this will be taking its place in my heart anytime soon, it's still a pretty cool moment.

Viewers should note that this screenshot is taken as Pine is completing the act of sitting down. So the fact that his head is lowered isn't an indication that he's nodded off on the bridge after a particularly vigorous shore leave. I thought I should point that out, since after all, this is Kirk that we're talking about.

(By the way, I'm assuming it should be patently obvious that I don't own any of the pictures or characters I'm putting up, don't pretend to, that they belong to whatever lucky corporate entity holds their respective copyright, and that I'm not making any money by using them to illustrate my rather rambling points. Pretty please don't sue me).

Anyway, I'm still in the dark how somebody as young as Chris Pine's Kirk gets to sit in the center seat when there are a whole starship full of people who seem to be at least as qualified, if not more so. But if I knew that, I wouldn't need to go see this movie. And, after seeing this trailer, I need to see this movie.

Mind you, I've been led astray by Star Trek trailers in the past. After Star Trek IV came out, I was panting for the next Star Trek movie. And when I saw the trailer for Star Trek V the first time, I was convinced it was going to be just as great as IV, if not better. Imagine, then, my disappointment, when I figured out that it had taken every interesting, exciting or funny moment in an entire two-plus hour film just to make a two minute trailer, and that the remaining umpity-ump seconds should have been left on the cutting room floor. Today, I feel about Trek V the way I feel about bad fan fiction. It never happened. There was no Trek movie between The Voyage Home and The Undiscovered Country.

So, there is precedent for disappointment, but until I am proven wrong by the actual facts, I will remain excited about this movie.

One thing that is already tempering my excitement, though, is this recent image gallery from Quantum Mechanix, which is a replica prop and model house I'm afraid I've never heard of. They were kind enough to post a series of views of their outstandingly detailed model of the new USS Enterprise, giving me for the first time a variety of different angles of this most iconic of ships. And, after a good long look by yours truly, the verdict is in.

I hate it.

I'm not usually one to talk badly about what I don't like about my fandoms. My disdain for the "Jar-Jar haters" is, or should be, the stuff of legend, and I have little patience for people who are supposed to like something, but instead spend all of their time complaining about what doesn't measure up. If you don't like something, that's fine, but don't throw water on my fire. And its possible that someone could find something to love about the new Enterprise. But that someone is not me. So if you don't want me to do that to you, now is the time to stop reading. And whatever you do, you should go to the gallery link above, and draw your own conclusion.

And, just for clarity's sake, the actual QM model is absolutely superb. It is the design the model was based on that I have issues with.

With those caveats out of the way, I can tell you that I only have three main problems — the nacelles, the primary hull and the secondary hull. Since these are the three principle components of the ship, that doesn't leave much left to like.

My biggest problems are the nacelles. The front domes (known as the Bussard collectors to us Trek engineering geeks) are grotesquely huge given the scale of the rest of the ship. Putting them so close together only accentuates this effect. In "Gung Ho," a Michael Keaton comedy about the auto industry, one of the Japanese workers describes a back-heavy 70s-era Chrysler as looking like "a fat American woman in stretch pants." Alas, that is similar to the feeling I get from looking at the new Enterprise's stern.

By contrast, the secondary hull would look sleek and graceful on any other ship. But with the almost-cartoonish look of the warp engines, it looks overwhelmed and out of balance. I say this as an admitted fan of bigger secondary hulls — a fact I will elaborate on in my promised, later post on my favorite Enterprise designs.

But back to this one. The best piece is possibly the circular, or primary, hull. This has historically been my favorite feature of the Enterprise's design. The new one is good, but is so similar to the movie Enterprise's primary as to be almost indistinguishable. The aztec detailing, raised phaser banks and identification fonts are strictly out of the first movie. I loved that design, mind you, but I was hoping for something new; not a re-hash of a thirty year old design.

Taken as a whole, the new ship looks like the movie Enterprise with a bad makeover; not a re-imagining of one of the most beautiful and iconic designs in the whole of science fiction. If I sound slightly miffed, it's because I am one of those fans to whom the Enterprise is one of the main characters. In my entire life, we have only been given six new variations of the original design. Considering how much I have loved some of the past versions, I must admit to being let down by this one. In fact, it may be one of the worst versions of the Enterprise yet conceived. And, for me, if you're going to get something wrong in a Star Trek movie, it had better not be the Enterprise.

I have heard it said that J.J. Abrams told the designers to take the movie and original series models, and combine them. If that's true, then I guess I know who to blame. Hopefully, this will be the only misstep the movie makes. And after some time to get acquainted, maybe the new proportions will grow on me. But right now, it's hard to get past the thought that somebody — maybe even a lot of somebodies — could have done a better job than this.